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Posted to fop-commits@xmlgraphics.apache.org by Apache Wiki <wi...@apache.org> on 2009/11/03 16:34:00 UTC

[Xmlgraphics-fop Wiki] Trivial Update of "AFPResources" by JeremiasMaerki

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The "AFPResources" page has been changed by JeremiasMaerki.
The comment on this change is: An additional free viewer popped up.
http://wiki.apache.org/xmlgraphics-fop/AFPResources?action=diff&rev1=6&rev2=7

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  From there its easy to get the rest. Open the PDF and in the section Related Publications the other relevant specifications are listed. Search for them on the above mentioned web site by Order Number and download them one by one.
  
- For those who don't have access to an IBM AFP environment it is very difficult to verify the correctness of any generated MO``:DCA document. Two free tools are available to help.
+ For those who don't have access to an IBM AFP environment it is very difficult to verify the correctness of any generated MO``:DCA document. Some free tools are available to help.
  
   * The AFP Viewer Internet Explorer plug-in allows viewing of .afp in your browser. It can be found by going to http://www.ibm.com and then enter "AFP Viewer" into the Search box at the top. The first returned result should point to a page from where the viewer can be downloaded.
  
@@ -37, +37 @@

  
   * [[http://www.btbnet.de/wps/portal/AFP-Tools|BTB Browser]] is another AFP viewer which is probably better suited for preview than IBM's tools as it doesn't replace bitmap fonts with platform fonts. It also has a good AFP decoder useful for debugging.
  
+  * [[http://www.isis-papyrus.com/e/pages/forms/2/afpviewerdlrequest.html|ISIS Papyrus Viewer]] has recently been made available for free. It is implemented as a browser plug-in.
+ 
  == Tips for developing with AFP ==
  
  MO``:DCA & Co. have grown over time but the specifications usually don't tell if a particular feature is an old or new feature. There are still a lot of AFP/IPDS environments around which only support a very old version and only bi-level printing. Relying on just the AFP Workbench has proven to be insufficient as this viewer supports a lot of features and is quite lenient about what you do in AFP. Furthermore, fonts are painted using operating system outline fonts even if you specify bitmap fonts in your print files. Obviously, the best way to test is having an older IPDS laser printer around but there you have the problem that you get non-helpful error messages if something's wrong. Additional, unfortunately commercial, viewer applications can help further during debugging. AFP dumpers like AFPAN (see above) are also a very important source for information. It is quite sensitive to mistakes. Rule number one: Test in as many environments as possible. No single tool will be able to tell you that the file you produced is correct and works in most environments.

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